Keysight Technologies Funds Heydari’s Research

Dec. 7, 2016 - Northern California electronic measurement firm Keysight Technologies has awarded Samueli School Professor Payam Heydari more than $30,000 to further his research into a novel bit-rate programmable broadband transceiver.

Heydari, professor of electrical engineering and computer science, and his research team in UC Irvine’s Integrated Circuits Lab, will design, simulate and implement an innovative photonic transceiver that will increase speed and efficiency of last-mile fiber to home and building infrastructures.

“The ever-increasing demand for broader bandwidth necessitates a high-speed optical communication backbone for applications ranging from data centers to last-mile connectivity,” Heydari said, adding that future applications could require users to adaptively control and/or vary data rates, saving energy while still meeting performance goals.

The CMOS (complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor) bit-rate programmable broadband transceiver will be developed on the Advanced Design System (ADS) platform – electronic-design automation software for radio-frequency, microwave and high-speed digital applications. The photonic transceiver will enable transmission up to 40 gigabits per second at 1550 nanometers of wavelength, transforming last-mile high-speed fiber.

Keysight Technologies Inc., formerly part of Hewlett Packard and later, Agilent, was spun off into a separate company in 2013. The gift from Keysight to Heydari was made through the company’s university relations program to support promising technologies in university research and encourage new collaborations. “This Keysight Award makes it possible to forge a long-term collaboration between UCI and Keysight Technologies and positions UCI as a Keysight Technologies strategic partner,” Heydari stated.

-- Anna Lynn Spitzer